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WoW Down to 9.6 Million Subscribers
Activision Blizzard's press release states that World of Warcraft is down to 9.6 million subscribers as of December 31, 2012. This is lower than the amount of subscribers from the "over 10 million" announced for Q3 2012. A few other interesting points:

Mists of Pandaria was the #3 best-selling PC game at retail.

Diablo III was the #1 best-selling PC game at retail, breaking PC-game sales records with more than 12 million copies sold worldwide through December 31, 2012.

It's quite obvious exactly what happens with this game. Every expansion launch the numbers jump up to 10 million, then a few months later they drop somewhere between 9 and 10 million and hover around there for the rest of the expansion. New expansion -> rinse and repeat.

So it's nothing out of the ordinary. People saying WoW is dying because of this are talking out of their asses; a game with only 500k subscribers is good enough to stay alive and well, so 9.6 million is ridiculously amazing, especially for the way the MMO market has been moving over the past couple of years.

WoW is stronger than strong, it's not going down until it wants to.

Dude get a grip you're in denial, that's nothing like what happens. WoW has 14 million at Wrath, then by the end of Cata under 10 million. By the end of this I don't even want to know. The only thing that has changed is the devs.

Ive never seen a 1 hour LFR even as a dps which i dont usually do, so i call bullshit

i have but usually only when im playing at odd hours or if i forget to do one and its late in the week. however i almost always am doing something else while im qued so the majority of the time i dont really care how long its taking

Some people can't play this game and not raid because raiding is why they play....I am one of those people. And raiding requires a certain amount of prep work.

I've raided with alts with more casual guilds and it is not satisfying, generally nice people but wiping on mechanics that you mastered in the first week is not enjoyable.

My guild isn't even that demanding, the stuff we expect from our raiders is pretty standard minus the required gold runs, etc that some top guilds require raiders to show up for.

I'm in the second best Alliance/5th best overall guild on my server and my guild doesn't expect shit from us except some basic encounter knowledge, flasks and potions. There are plenty of less demanding guilds out there that still succeed. If you will settle for no less than the very cutting edge of progression, but aren't willing to take advantage of every avenue offered toward that goal, then that's a fundamental disconnect that is your own fault, not Blizzard's.

You (and about a billion other players) are complaining because Blizzard gives you a lot of options for improving your character and you feel "compelled" to do them all because of your own choices and goals.

I would love to see a shred of evidence that you didn't pull this number straight from your ass.

obviously it's not going to be 9.6, that's wow current and dropping numbers. Elder Scrolls franchise is known for making amazing games and I'm sure whatever they bring out will take a chunk out of wow subs.

i have but usually only when im playing at odd hours or if i forget to do one and its late in the week. however i almost always am doing something else while im qued so the majority of the time i dont really care how long its taking

True that i usually run Kara or TK while im waiting since you can solo them now, kills time, i get good looking gear (something we havent seen since BC) and it brings back happy memories butt fuck it i started playing tera and the battle/healing system in that game is about 10x more engaging than wow

does anyone have the exact article from a while back? or was it a tweet? i cant remember. but something like 3 million people who pet battle regularly or something. that would actually be more than all of the raiders to.

so if im remembering correctly that means there are more people that pet battle than raiders *including lfr* and pvpers.

but less than a million people pvp anyways so having more people means nothing in that regard

---------- Post added 2013-02-08 at 12:06 AM ----------

chen stormstout is the greatest character in the history of warcraft

Did they also state what they conasider "regularly" ? I bring myself to grind my pets up at least one level every 2 months, by the very definition of the word that means im doing it on a regular basis. Statistical comments like these from blizzard are just hollow phrases if you don't know the circumstances. Its the same with the the once a month people logging in in china to see of their shit is still there. Way too vage to make a good argument for or against anything if you don't have all the data.

obviously it's not going to be 9.6, that's wow current and dropping numbers. Elder Scrolls franchise is known for making amazing games and I'm sure whatever they bring out will take a chunk out of wow subs.

So in other words, yes, you did completely fabricate that number. Gotcha.

---------- Post added 2013-02-08 at 05:20 AM ----------

Originally Posted by bigjohnburger

It's an mmo. So that being the case maybe from the Massively multiplayer...

Blizzard has multiple servers for a reason, and it should be obvious why they don't let people transfer for free, but if it's not obvious to you then you're not gonna believe my explanation.

a.) A small loss of 500k is actually huge.
b.) The most popular MMORPG is dying now.
c.) Mike Morrhaime will come out and say most of the losses were in the East despite it being illegal.
d.) Ghostcrawler sucks but give him a break because he doesn't run everything on his own.

I'm in the second best Alliance/5th best overall guild on my server and my guild doesn't expect shit from us except some basic encounter knowledge, flasks and potions. There are plenty of less demanding guilds out there that still succeed. If you will settle for no less than the very cutting edge of progression, but aren't willing to take advantage of every avenue offered toward that goal, then that's a fundamental disconnect that is your own fault, not Blizzard's.

You (and about a billion other players) are complaining because Blizzard gives you a lot of options for improving your character and you feel "compelled" to do them all because of your own choices and goals.

I call BS or you are the GM of your guild or are otherwise in a secure raid spot, competitive guilds mean that you have constant pressure to maximize your performance in raid encounters.

You only have options regarding how you earn your valor in this expansion once you have earned the required rep to spend it, which can only be acquired through dailies. That is not choice. Having a crap ton of dailies is fine, next time remove the rep requirement or offer alternative ways to rep grind.

I have no issues with dailies but I do have an issue with them being required if you want to spend your valor.

Originally Posted by Magpai

The person I quoted was answering my question about how many subs ELDER SCROLLS had, not WoW. But by all means continue giving me reading advice, lol.

judging by your avatar I can see you love the panda's. Sure some people have embraced them but they are still a strange addition. a single character from a moba game is expanded into a new wow expansion. I still think they went off the path in more than one way. Quests, and dungeons should use the lore they have. Its deep and involving. To turn their back on it and introduce a random race was in miy opinion a bad idea.

I would of continued with the legion story and introduced pandas that way, as an ancient enemy to them that help you out. Not base an entire expansion around them, I still suspect its because over 70% of their player base is chinese.

As much as I enjoy the lore, WoW is pretty much dead to me until the next expansion perhaps. not too sure why I'm bothering to post.

So in other words, yes, you did completely fabricate that number. Gotcha

Blizzard has multiple servers for a reason, and it should be obvious why they don't let people transfer for free, but if it's not obvious to you then you're not gonna believe my explanation.

It was a joke, you don't get out much do you? And you're saying if people can't play the game the way its meant to be played they should just sit there and keep forking out money when they can't play? You can't do anything in wow except quest without other people. And if you think it's so obvious then enlighten me with a non laughable reason.

Ok 1st off I want to get this out of the way I have not played WoW since Wrath but do want to state somthing to some of these haters right fast and I know my grammer is goin suck. But for 1 go here
WoW was at 9.1mil subs last year now at 9.6mil so that is 500k sub gain since then so basicly what happend was MoP came out old players came back some didn't like and some did and stayed and we lost some not saying that was all the 500k but prob most. and here is some math for you to understand that this is not a HUGE lost.
with 10 mil subs WoW made $150000000 monthly and $1800000000 yearly
With 9.6mil subs WoW makes $144000000 monthly and $1728000000 Yearly
So with the lost of 400k subs they lose $6000000 Monthly and $72000000 Yearly
but last year they only had 9.1mil subs so thats a gain since then of 500k subs so the gain in money since then would be
$7500000 Monthly and $90000000 Yearly So you say they are doin bad and lost a huge amount of money? I say no they prob know that #of subs will go up when a new xpac releases and then go back down when the buzz is gone I would bet everything I own that they accounted on a lose in subs and prob even accounted on a bigger lost then what happened so I will say to you the game is not diying or even close prob got another xpac mabey 2 left in it unless a BIG game drops or unless blizz cuts the cord with titan(prob how wow will die). Pls stop making these post cause all ppl see is a lost not the fact that in the big picture they have gained money income over the last year. plus the money made from Blizz store items, transfers, name change, and race change. So this game is not even close to diying it is bumping live and well just cause it's not in the golden era of WoW any more is shit if you like it or not the game is alive and well. I havn't played in a few years and been playing other MMOs today none of which made me fell the same as WoW used to but WoW can't make me fell that way any more either. Do I love the game no is it a good game yes so play it or not you gotta give it to blizz for makeing the top running MMO out for 7-8years and prob end up 10-11years before they shut it down. I will end saying this WoW will end when blizz says for it to end not a min before. Thank you have a nice day